With just the minimal Debian etch (didn't try sarge) installed, I got a few errors while compiling Subversion due to missing required libraries.

So below is a checklist to run so that ./configure while work from the first try (since it takes looooong to run, I thought it could be useful )

Make sure you have a decent C compiler installed (note: on “etch” I needed both GCC and G++, otherwise I got an error: “Error: C compiler cannot create executables” while running ./configure) It also needs zlibc (actually a few other related libs too)

Run these commands to be sure you have everything to configure subversion succesfully

Note1: Remember to drink a cup of coffee (or 3) Note2: There are some parameters to set if you want to use subversion through Apache. But please remember that it requires Apache 2.0, and in my experience the DNS-323 is not powerful enough to run this. - Sorry - But if you want to try out, remember to check the install manual for parameters.